Possessions have a way of controlling your time, budget and stress level. Take a close look at your office. Have you accumulated everything from extra furniture to additional magazines and papers? Sometimes when you work in the same office for so long, you no longer notice how it looks. Take a close look at your office and take note of how much clutter there is and how you can reduce it. There are a few simple steps you can take to get started.
• Designate specific places for incoming magazines, reference materials and sales materials. Stacking bins work well for magazines and papers to file (they're larger than stacking trays). Place them next to or under your desk and label them "to read," "to file," "information to enter," etc.
• Go through your reading bin and get rid of the newspapers and magazines that you haven't read for the past year. If they have been in your office for several months and you haven't read them by now, you won't read them in the future. If you see an article of interest while sorting through the publications, clip the article and recycle the rest of the publication. Also, consider converting your subscription to an online version.
• Sort through the books in your bookcase and give away the books you have had for years and will never look at again. Charities are always looking for donations to their reading programs. Also, you could make a few extra dollars by selling your books to bookstores that sell used books.
• Clear your office of broken equipment. You may have an old computer that you've been meaning to fix or a printer that no longer works. Instead of wasting valuable space in your office, donate anything that you know you won't use again. If a piece of equipment can be fixed and is worth fixing, make arrangements to do so within a week. Keep in mind that the price of office equipment continues to drop and it may be cheaper to buy a new piece of equipment than fix it.
• Keep track of what you own by using a combination of open and closed shelving to store supplies and information, especially if you follow the "out of sight, out of mind" philosophy. If supplies and information aren't hidden behind closed doors, they'll need to be more organized than if they were hidden (not a bad idea anyway).
• Make decisions about paperwork. When a piece of paper crosses your desk, follow my P-A-P-E-R method for handling paper. P-Put the paper in a file (either current or reference file) or bin (for reading materials); A-Act on the piece of paper; P-Pass the information on to someone else; E- Enter (on your to-do list) any action you need to take with regard to that piece of paper, then file or toss the piece of paper; R-Recycle (or "round file") as many papers as possible. Get out of the habit of keeping papers you know you'll never need.
• Remove any items from your desk drawers that you’re not using on a regular basis and replace them with supplies, current files or other information that will help you stay productive. Anything you use rarely should be stored in your credenza or on a nearby bookcase.
• Devote a few hours each month to organizing your office (or less frequently if your office currently is manageable). Be disciplined and don't take any phone calls during this organizing session. Maintain your office by spending a few minutes at the end of each day putting away files and preparing for the next day.
Possessions can help you be more productive and make your life easier until you accumulate too many things and lose sight of their purpose. Make the decision to keep your office clear of any unnecessary items and you will be left with more space and more time to work.
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